Divine Intervention
by A. Meril
Summary: For you are goddesses, inside on everything, know everything. But we mortals hear only the news, and know nothing at all. --Homer
1. Varda

**Disclaimer, applicable to this and all future chapters: **All character/setting/basically everything belongs to the Professor. I'm just messing around in the sandbox.

* * *

**Divine Intervention**

**I. Varda**

_Varda looks out from shining Taniquetil._

_ She smiles, pleased, and  
a galaxy flares to life. _

_"Beautiful..."_

_The sound of Her voice is carried  
through vast skies,  
sliding between the stars,  
the earth;  
breathing through every wind. _

_But what is this? _

_She leans closer, looking._

_Ragged ships, sails torn, bobbing tiredly in the great north bay, _  
_and the south bay as well!  
Exhausted travelers spill across the beaches in waves. _

_Two tired and careworn men, whispering beside a fire:_

"We must search for them."

"No, we do not know this land."

_She-of-many-names frowns, displeased.  
(The galaxy trembles.) _

_Varda likes her universe ordered. _

_"These men, these  
youngest-children-of-the-One, these  
wanderers.  
They mar the perfection of Today. _

_That will never do."_

_Leaning closer-closer-closer,  
descending silent through the skies,  
alighting on ghostlike tiptoe next to the ragged pair. _

_The eldest one starts, wide-eyed, speechless._

"Isildur?"

_She smiles, steps closer,  
lays a hand across Eldest's cheek, whispers in his ear:  
"Go north, and you will find what you seek."_

_Later, as She examines a divine fingernail,  
watching absently as Eldest rises the last hill,  
and joyfully reunites with  
his tall father, wide-smiling mother,  
family, friends,  
and the rest of his people… _

_She thinks, There. _

_Perfect._

* * *

**Notes: **Unfortunately, the version presented here is not exactly how I intended this fic to be. For this chapter, I had a picture to go along with it, but ffnet doesn't allow coding for pictures. If you would like to see the true version of this story, please visit **Henneth Annûn** (a.k.a. HASA) or **Tolkien Fanfiction** (a.k.a. TFF), pen name Meril at both. My profile at both places is linked in my profile here.


	2. Yavanna

**Divine Intervention**

**II. Yavanna**

_"Sister,  
Sister!_

_Where are You, Sister?  
Our Festival starts anon!"_

_Yavanna,  
She-of-fewer-names-than-Varda,  
yawns,  
stretching over Her silken divan beneath Arien's light  
vines trailing after Her fingers,  
ripping through the sheets and erupting  
into a stream of crimson flowers._

_Varda  
dislikes  
Yavanna's apartments, She knows, seeing  
Sister's flashing eyes darken at the sight of the  
hanging  
moss,  
the perpetually vine-encrusted furniture, the  
carpet of mushrooms near the door._

_Varda  
is  
neat  
orderly  
perfectionistic  
and  
obsessive-compulsive.  
Even  
the  
stars  
are  
evenly  
spaced._

_Whereas Yavanna prefers the soft, the  
filthy but comfortable,  
revels  
in unevenness and imbal-  
ance._

_"SISTER!"_

_Kementári rolls Her eyes and  
pops a grape into Her mouth,  
stretching,  
waiting for the divine  
SHRIEKS  
("How irritating She can be!")  
to fade._

_When the halls are silent once more, Yavanna  
jumps  
down and looks over the balcony's edge, examining  
affairs Below._

_"Interesting," She muses, tracing a dark thread of marble  
on the balustrade, watching  
Olórin and The Scruffy Wanderer  
(her own nickname)  
trading stories beside a campfire._

_Idly, she sends a cloud of midges  
to bother Scruffy,  
to nip his neck and give him annoyance,  
all of which gently nurse her grudge..._

_O, what long-held shame!  
O, what snide comparisons!_

_"Did You hear that, Sister?  
The Elves have created six hundred more hymns to  
Me!"_

_"Charming."_

_"Have You seen, Sister?  
My  
image hangs in palaces from  
Gondor to Mithlond!  
The delightful dears!"_

_"Quite."_

_And that final straw..._

_"Sister, that Ranger, that Aragorn,  
has sworn by  
Me  
to win his love!  
How quaint!"_

_"...Indeed."_

_Delightful.  
Quaint.  
Of course._

_Did he forget that athelas,  
(his birthright, his power)  
belonged to Her?  
Did he not recall that his herblore  
was Her domain, that  
everything he was famed for  
was from _Her_?_

_No._

_Selfish mortal._

_So she spited him with many  
difficulties  
of freezing winters, parched summers, and  
inopportune injuries,  
lazily,  
from her living, leaf-strewn throne._

_Ha.  
Ha._

_"May you be plagued by them," she thinks smugly, and--_

_sneezes._

_"Oh!"_

_A seed slips from Her palm,  
white, wrinkled,  
and now covered in Her sacred spit.  
Shaking Her hand in disgust, She flips it  
over the balcony  
towards Arda._

_It lands with a tiny "thump" in the southern mountains.  
She peers closer,  
examining the soil, the snow,  
and exhales on it, Her breath causing nearby trees to  
instantly  
grow twenty feet._

_She pads back to Her divan_

.

.

.

_falls back into slumber_

.

.

_while Sister's stars wheel _

.

_overhead, _

.

.

_time passing, _

.

_dreaming of her forests, _

.

.

.

.

_their peace,  
_

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

_her children_

.

.

_on Arda, _

.

_growing from seedlings  
_

.

.

.

.

.

.

_among harsh soils and  
_

.

.

.

_inconstant rains.  
_

.

.

.

.

_Years pass in a blink  
_

.

.

_of Her eyes,  
_

.

.

.

.

_or minutes  
depending on HIS whims_

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

_and suddenly She awakens,  
yawning wide and blinking away sleep._

_In the south, She sees,  
propping her chin on the balustrade,  
there is a to-do over a new king.  
Yavanna is dismissive until--  
"O, by Me!"  
--she recognizes "king" as "Scruffy."_

_She is childishly delighted at his new deference, actually  
clapping aloud!  
He worships Her Sister, yet  
kneels  
to these small, rounded beings..._

_...and what victory is that?_

_Feeling slightly triumphant,  
she salutes Scruffy-king with a gracious hand--_

_Wait._

_She squints.  
Listens._

"Lo! here is a scion of the Eldest of Trees!"

_A pause._

_She giggles, and watches as Scruffy-king and Olórin  
step  
closer._

_An oblique wave of her hand, and  
the soil around the tree loosens, freeing itself  
into Scruffy's grasp._

_Yavanna yawns again, watching them  
through drooping eyes._

_A celebration, with silken banners  
and rejoicing crowds, thronging the streets  
of the circular city.  
Cups being raised to peace, to  
the king,  
praises to Varda  
("Hmph.")  
for the blessedly clear night._

_Lounging balanced on the balustrade  
stretching clear from horizon to horizon,  
Yavanna dips a hand down through the clouds,  
down millions of leagues  
into the city,  
nudging a maiden's heart into lust,  
placing a handsome guard in her path  
and settling back to watch._

_(Varda  
likes  
perfect love stories:  
Scruffy's love for the Princess, his quest  
to win kingdom-crown-and-all, his  
hidden heritage.  
Yavanna likes her stories to have  
a bit of color,  
but she usually has them turn out all right.)_

_"There," she thinks,  
drowsily,_

_and  
slowly_

_drifts_

_back into  
_

.

.

.

.

_sleep._


End file.
